Greenpoint’s Co-Op 87 Records to Rebrand as Brooklyn Record Exchange

The new Brooklyn Record Exchange at 599 Johnson Ave., Co-Op 87 records in Greenpoint is in the process of relaunching as a second BRE location (image courtesy of BRE)

A pair of vinyl record stores from the founders of Greenpoint’s Co-Op 87 (87 Guernsey st.) and the indie record label Mexican Summer are set to debut.

The Co-Op 87 space has been operating under reduced hours and will re-brand and relaunch as the “Brooklyn Record Exchange” sometime this spring. Meanwhile, the Brooklyn Record Exchanges’ first location will open this weekend on the second floor inside the same complex that is home to the live music venue Elsewhere (599 Johnson Ave.) in E. Williamsburg.

Bedford and Bowery caught up with Ben Steidel of Co-Op 87 who explained the new E. Williamsburg shop is “just a larger version of what we were aiming to do at Co-Op, with room to do all the things we wanted to do there.”

BRE at 599 Johnson Ave. (courtesy of BRE)

Greenpoint is home to many record stores including Captured Tracks (195 Calyer St.), The Record Grouch (986 Manhattan Ave.), Academy Records (85 Oak St.), The Thing (1001 Manhattan Ave.), and even more vinyl stores are located just across the Williamsburg/Greenpoint border including Rough Trade Records (64 N. 9th St.) and Earwax Records (167 N. 9th St).

While streaming services dominate the music industry’s sales, a vinyl record revival has aided the 12 percent growth of physical music sales in the U.S last year, to $9.85 billion, which was greater than the revenue from music downloads last year as CNET reports.

Downloads represented just 11 percent of US labels’ revenue last year, a music industry trade group said Thursday. Physical sales — the term for music formats you can actually hold, which are mostly CDs and vinyl at this point — booked 12 percent. Instead, streaming music has been asphyxiating demand for downloads. Streaming sales were 75 percent of revenue last year, according to year-end data from the Recording Industry Association of America, or RIAA.